A double-decker bus packed with schoolchildren and commuters collided with a truck and plunged off a Hong Kong expressway bridge yesterday, killing at least 22 and injuring 20, police said.

?Rescuers have removed all bodies from the bus and cranes are lifting the bus to see if there are people pinned underneath,? a government spokeswoman told Reuters of one of the territory?s worst traffic accidents in years. The bus crashed through a bridge safety barricade on the busy Tuen Mun Road in the New Territories shortly after dawn and tumbled 50 metres down a cliff.

Skid marks left at the site of the crash indicated the collision, police said. Officers were questioning the truck driver. ?At some point both drivers applied their brakes, you can see from the scene the large skid marks,? the police officer told reporters. The impact left part of the bus embedded in the earth and rescuers had to saw their way through part of its crumpled hull to free those trapped inside. The roof of the bus was sheered off completely.

Several passengers died instantly and some of the injured were as young as 10, officials said. Local television showed clips of rescuers pulling bodies from the mangled wreckage.

?My little niece saw the bus fall off the bridge and crash on to the hillside with a big bang,? an elderly woman living near the bridge told reporters. ?She was crying and saying many people would die.?

The bus driver, who was making his first trip of the day, was killed, said Chan Cho Chak, managing director of the bus company, Kowloon Motor Bus Holdings Ltd. Chan ruled out any problems with the vehicle, saying it was relatively new and had undergone maintenance just a few days ago.